


The choices we don't make

by linfanny



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Gen, and akaashi is a kind and observant person, just akaashi being the right person as the right moment, kenma is confused and lonely, mentions of paranoia and anxiety, not really romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-25
Updated: 2016-07-25
Packaged: 2018-07-26 16:12:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,078
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7581070
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/linfanny/pseuds/linfanny
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Adult’s life is just a game he struggled to play for Kenma. There’s no way to reset the choices, no suggestion on which is the best path to take. He doesn’t want to be helped, he doesn’t want to be commiserated, he wants nothing of the sort. He just wants not to be judged, and maybe a little to be understood. Akaashi understands, and that, maybe, is enough.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The choices we don't make

 

Every gamer knew it. It always happened in adventure games, or in role-plays. You completed a quest, and then you wandered around randomly, looking for what was coming next, searching for a new road you could take with a just obtained item, a way that was closed before, a new character appeared on the map. You didn’t know where to go, or what to do, so you just wandered around, looking for something, but without knowing what you were exactly looking for.

Game after game, you got used to that; you learned the pattern behind it, and it became easier and easier to guess what you need to look for next. You had the map, you understood the scheme, you knew where to go. This is how it worked in games. Kenma knew so well how to move in there; when he didn’t know, he guessed, and he almost always guessed it right. There was no tutorial to understand how to move in life as well.

The problem was the same. You’ve completed a quest, and you didn’t know where to go.

Kenma graduated high-school four years before with a blank page in front of his eyes, too many paths that opened in ahead of him, and no indication at all about what was coming next.

He chose University because everybody was doing that. Some of his classmates applied to companies or shops for a job, but he had no idea of where he wanted to work, or what he wanted to do. He knew how to study; he was also good at that. Neutral good, like in lots of things in his life. He went to Tokyo, because Kuroo was there, because it seemed an obvious choice from a lot of guys that want to keep studying. He chose a History major, because he was good at that. He had good grades, he didn’t mind it. It was something he could do.

Kuroo graduated in Chemistry the year before. A Pharmacy company in Saitama offered him a job, and he moved there right after his degree. He liked his job, he said. He has new housemates and he liked them too. He called Kenma at least once a week, but he always kept his calls short. Kenma missed Kuroo, but still hated speaking on the phone. They still texted, but often he wished he was still there; he missed having him around, I missed living in the same house as him, he missed the time they passed in silence, or chatting about nothing, or playing games together. Kuroo was a terrible gamer in general, but he enjoyed strategic games, and often suggested Kenma good solutions or paths to follow.

He just- missed him.

He missed being himself without being judged.

He brought his Xbox back at his parent’s house when Kuroo’s moved out. He hadn’t a TV in his room, and playing in the living room became unbearable. He didn’t care about what people think, he always told himself. But the chatting and quiet laughing and whispering of his housemates while he was playing- Kenma didn’t know if they were talking about him, but probably they did, surely they did, as if he didn’t notice how they side-eyed him and smirked just like he was _funny-_

He brought the Xbox back at his parent’s house. He kept the PSP and his 3DS, and he didn’t move from his room, playing with his headphones on so he couldn’t see what they said. He hated those people, but he needed housemates. He couldn’t ask his parents to pay the rent of an entire apartment just for him; he needed to wait just nine more months. _Nine_ months, and then-

And then he didn’t know what was next. What path to choose. Which object would unlock the next quest.

_ What the fuck he should do. _

Apparently, at 21 years old he should know what to do. At least have an idea, a path, any kind of path. And no, one of his housemates informed him, planning which games to buy in the following month didn’t count as a plan. It was a joke, he said, but it was one borderline joke, the ones that were funny only for the ones who told them, and therefore they weren’t jokes at all.

Aside from Kuroo, his parents were the only ones that didn’t try to put any pressure on him. His mother always told him to take his time. His father was satisfied as long as he got decent grades, and asked no more, too involved in his work and in his meetings with colleagues and friends to stop and ask his only son about his future.

He should already be sending work candidatures to offices. Kuroo had started with that as soon as he began his final year, but Kenma had yet to do a damn internet search for that. He didn’t want to apply for random places, where he’d have to work with random people, talk with them, being asked about things. Apparently, gaming wasn’t a well enough interest when you were 21. Apparently, there were a lot of “more interesting” things he could do instead.

His mother told him just to find someone who shared his same interests. That nothing was wrong with him, even if Kenma never complained about that. His mother just understood; and yet, she didn’t.

Kenma just liked to be alone in his room with his 3DS, texting with Kuroo, and avoiding to look at his computer who was waiting all the choices he should make. He hid it under the bed, where he couldn’t see it. He hid his anxiety and tried not to think about it.

He didn’t want anyone who shared his same interest; he didn’t want anyone in general. He just wanted not to be judged, and wanted to be free to not choose for a while. He wanted to push the world’s “pause” button, and have some rest.

 

He thought he heard a noise over his headphones. He paused his game, reluctantly took his headphones off. He listened. Someone knocked on his door. His stomach stung; his housemates had guests - he could hear their voices chatting and laughing before putting his headphones on, and closed everything out. Someone knocked again. He put his game under the blankets as a habit - not that they didn’t know what he was doing anyway, but he hated when they peaked in his room, saw, judged- He couldn’t hide himself under the blankets as well, so he opened the door.

“Oh, fine. I thought they were mocking me”.

It wasn’t one of his housemates. He was a guy he had never met before. Kenma instinctively took a step back, glancing at him with suspicion, wondering what he wanted to do.

“I’m sorry, they’re making a mess in the kitchen”, the stranger explained, and a high and loud laugh came to confirm his words, “and half of them- well, make all of them, are too close to be drunk. We’ve just finished a study session together, I should’ve expected it would’ve ended like this”. The guy didn’t have an amused face while speaking. Kenma nodded, out of courtesy, still not understanding what all of that had to do with him.

“And- I can’t go home, you know, because I’ll need to leave with Bokuto-san, and I’m pretty sure he won’t be able not even to go down the stairs if I leave him alone, so”, he shrugged, hesitantly, “they’ve told me they’ve another roommate, and that you were in your room, so I supposed- Would you like to watch a movie, or something? I honestly like to stay away from that hell as much as I could”.

“You can go for a walk”, Kenma suggested, still studying him furtively, unsure of what he wanted. They told they’ve another roommate, the guy said. Kenma didn’t know exactly what they told him. He could imagine it, though, and the thought made him nauseous. He wanted to close the door, come back to bed, put himself under the blankets. But the guy had been kind, he did nothing wrong, and so he stayed.

“It’s already dark outside, and there’s literally nothing around there, aside from a convenience store and a Pachinko down the street”, he shrugged. “I used to live in this ward too, during my first year. I shared a flat just down this street, in that gray palace with a lot of bikes piled in the garden”.

Kenma nodded. He passed in front of it on his way to the metro stop. He didn’t know there were actual people live in there. He never cared to wonder, at least.

“Well, if he bothers you, I won’t disturb you again”, it was the guy that took a step behind, but then he lifted a shopping bag that Kenma didn't notice before. “I have stolen a bag of popcorn from their provisions, and I saw you've got a quite interesting collection of DVDs”. His “you” didn’t include him, Kenma thought. None of these movies were his. “If you want”, he twisted his fingers, tilted his head, “I’d like to have company, I think”.

Kenma didn’t answer, lifted his gaze to look at him again. He didn’t know this guy at all, but he didn’t feel harmed, and he realized his shoulders were relaxed too, while moments ago they were tensed to the point to cause him pain. He didn’t realize he was nodding until he saw the guy's pale smile, and then him moving one more step back to let him out, as he knew that Kenma needed space to move, like a shy, half-wild cat who always walked near the walls. Kenma stepped out of the door, carefully closing it behind his shoulders, but the guy didn’t even try to look inside. He let him reach the armchair on the right, then sat cross-legged in front of the small library, looking at the row of DVDs, then back at Kenma, who was rolled up on the armchair, his arms around his legs, his chin resting on his knees.

“Any preference?”, the guy asked.

Kenma shook his head. A burst of laughter came from the kitchen, followed by someone screaming words Kenma didn’t understand.

“Yes. Sorry for that. I closed the door, but it doesn’t have much effect, does it?”, he twisted his mouth. “I hope you don’t have that kind of neighbors that call the police for that”.

Kenma shook his head again. Their neighbors were a old woman almost totally deaf, and two guys that never came back home before five in the morning. They shouldn’t give any problem.

“I hope you like superheroes movies”, the guy added, “because there’s literally nothing else here. Oh, this one is cool”, he lifted a copy of The Dark Knight. “Okay to you?”

Kenma nodded. He probably had already watched it, with Kuroo and his friends, but he usually played with his 3DS or PSP during the movies, so he didn’t remember for sure. He let go his knees, took a deep breath, and grabbed a pillow which put on his legs. He waited for the guy to put the movie into the recorder, then grabbed the controller and landed on the couch. He pressed the button and waited the device to switch on.

“My name’s Akaashi, by the way”, he turned towards Kenma again, as the anty-piracy warning started running on the screen. “Akaashi Keiji. You’re Kozume-san, right?”

He nodded. “Kenma”, he said, mid-voice, plunging his fingers in the pillow. He never quit the child's habit to give his given name first. “Kozume Kenma”.

Akaashi smiled. “They told me right, then”. He pressed a button to skip the trailer. “They told me you liked gaming, too”.

Kenma grabbed the pillow tightly. “Yes”, he breathed out.

“Which kind of games?”

Kenma glanced at Akaashi. He skipped another trailer on TV, while twisting his toes with his left hands, his legs collected on the couch. “You don’t need to answer, if you don’t want to”, he added, as he finally reached the movie’s main menu.

“Lots of kinds”, Kenma muttered. And then- “I’m into Triforce Heroes now. It’s kinda fun”.

Akaashi gave a mild laugh. “I’m afraid I’ve never heard of it. I played some Pokémon ages ago, but I’m not really a great knower of games. What is it?”

“It’s a multiplayer game”, Kenma explained. “You need two more persons to play it properly. You can connect with other players on the net-”

Akaashi nodded. “Surely things change, right? I remember i need to connect my game boy by cable to get a Clefairy from my friend. I probably still have it somewhere”.

“I still have it, too. I’ve collected all the 151 Pokémon on the Yellow version. It had been my very first game”.

“Mine too, but stayed alone. No. I think I’ve played another one, at my friend’s house. He had got a Playstation, back then. There were Disney characters in it? A key-shaped weapon?”

“Kingdom Hearts”, Kenma nodded. “I used to play it too”.

“Yeah, it was fun, right? Though I don’t really remember how it worked, I fear”.

When Akaashi started the movie, Kenma’s grasp on the pillow was just out of habit. When had been the last time he watched a movie from the beginning to an end, without distracting himself? Now he couldn’t interrupt it or get up or go back in his room - it wouldn’t be nice towards Akaashi, and Akaashi had been nice to him, even if he didn’t have to - but more than that, he didn’t want to. The movie was actually nice. He liked the Joker. He liked the fact that he didn’t simply care about the consequences, that he didn’t do things for a reason, but only because he wanted to do them. Okay, being him a major villain and a murderer maybe it wasn’t exactly a positive thing, but Kenma believed there was a zone between a world full of heavy responsibilities and pressure and the complete chaos. Maybe that was the world he needed to find and settled there, if a place like that existed in the real world.

Akaashi needed to raise the volume of the TV several times, as the ones in the kitchen didn’t decide it was the right time to stop laughing at full lungs. Sometimes they’ve heard one of them leaving the kitchen to go to the bathroom, and someone peeked in the living room and said something to Akaashi, while Kenma did his best to ignore him, completely focused on Bruce Wayne trying to save his girlfriend. Generally, after those incursions Akaashi sighed and needed to get up from the couch to go close the door they always left open, leaving their squalls to fill all the space in the living room.

As the movie ended, they still were quite noisy behind the closed door, but Kenma’s pillow was fallen on the ground, and he couldn’t avoid to smile as Akaashi mocked their screams with faces, as he pulled the DVD out of the recorder.

“Wanna watch the sequel?”. It was one in the morning. Kenma’s eyelids started to become heavy, and he wasn’t sure he couldn’t resist for another three hours.

“Nevermind”, Akaashi grinned, then rolled back on the couch. “I’ll need to go call them soon anyway. None of us had courses before the afternoon tomorrow, but I still need one of them able to walk if I don’t want to carry him on my shoulders ‘til home”, he yawned, covering his mouth with his hand. “You study, too?”

Kenma nodded. “History”, he told him.

“Year?”

“Fourth”.

“Like me then. Any idea of what doing next?”

Kenma should’ve guessed they would hit that button. Every conversation touched it, sooner or later, and why it should not? It was an obvious question to ask, a question to which most people know how to answer. "Most people" excluded him.

“No”, he muttered. He searched for his pillow, but then remembered he had dropped it on the ground.

“Me neither”, Akaashi sighed, without looking at him as he was an alien, without making comments. “I’d like to continue, but I’m also tired. But I’m not sure of what I want to do as a real job, to be honest. I love Biology - that’s what I’m studying - but aside from that, the choice is never easy. Well, I’m in good company”, he pointed with his chin towards the kitchen door. The noises had somehow lowered down. “No-one’s there had any idea too. If it’s their idea of a night of studying, though, I guess they’ll don’t need to have one in years”.

“Aren’t they medical students?”, Kenma asked. Being in medical school, in his mind, meant having a pretty clear idea of what you want to do in life. He somehow admired them- well, not in that exact moment, to be fair.

“Yes, they are. They'll have a Biology-centered exam next week, so they’ve asked for my help. We have worked this afternoon, but”, he grimaced, “I guess that with that they’ve already forgot everything they’ve learned. Or maybe it’s me that’s a boring auntie, as one of my roommates called me”.

“I think you’re not”.

Akaashi smiled. “Thanks”, and he didn’t look like he was mocking him. “I need to go and call them now”, he got up from the couch, “it’s really time to go”.

Kenma looked at him walking towards the kitchen, without a visible burden of his shoulders for being someone incapable to make his choices yet, just a walking a little lopsided from having sit on his right leg for too long.

“You can come back anytime”, he blurted, and for once without regretting it later. “If you want to”, he added.

Akaashi turned to look at him and smiled. “I’d like to. We still have a sequel to watch. Goodnight, Kozume-san”.

Kenma come back to his room, but didn’t pulled the computer back from under the bed, he just checked his phone to find if there were Kuroo’s messages, but as always he procrastinated the replies to the next day. He was dead tired; he switched off his 3DS, as his half-asleep brain recorded semi-suffocated noises of people chatting and doors closing. He fell asleep, and when he wake up, the burden in his stomach weren’t so unbearable for the first time in a very long time.

**Author's Note:**

> I always try to be super-cautious when writing stories like this. The narration is all filtered through Kenma's eyes, and anxiety is a very dark caleidoscope sometimes.


End file.
